"Every allogene has their own interpretation and chosen understanding of how Visions are obtained and granted."
His tone didn't change, the smile on his face still present.
"Of course, as with everything else, there must be an objective truth--whether mortals or even gods are meant to reach it is another question."
Kujou Sara is a great example. While she understands that ambition plays a significant role in becoming an allogene, she interprets it through the lens of her Electro Vision being given and acknowledged by the Electro Archon herself.
She believes the Electro Archon witnessed her resolve and perseverance, and thus granted her this gift.
Dantalion continued.
"If you had reframed it as, 'I don't want anyone else to feel the oppression I did,' or, 'How dare this mere island constrain me...!' and with everything I know about your past, you could have fit the criteria for one."
Casually, without checking if Atsuko had absorbed what he said, he added, "In theory, that is."
With the same unchanged expression, he clarified, "It all depends on whether you have the means and capability to influence the world."
As he said that, Dantalion added silently to himself, 'If we were to look at it as if this were still a game, if you don't carry any narrative weight, you have an extremely low chance to obtain one.'
He had fanned the fires of war to study whether it was possible to force an awakening--to see if Visions could be induced through carefully orchestrated ambition.
He had orchestrated the scenarios, the mood, the dominoes of cause and effect to have every single subject fit the criteria and ignite an ambition strong enough.
And none of the subjects obtained one.
Two theories resulted from it.
Either every single Vision that had existed and will ever exist had already been decided even before anyone was born.
Or none of these people had the potential to influence the world.
Following that logic, he challenged both theories, testing every angle he could devise, every discovery that could shake these conclusions.
For now, he refused to let himself progress. Instead, he decided to find ways to dispute and contradict these two ideas until nothing remained standing.
After all, nothing good results from a foundation built on loose sand.
He refused to form an assumption and then look for evidence to support it.
Finding what makes something right is the easiest part.
For example, the first theory can be supported with: "That would make sense, as not everyone with grand ambition to the point of madness has obtained a Vision, yet those with seemingly insignificant wishes manage to get one."
And for the second idea: "It doesn't matter whether you have the ambition, wish, and past that relates to the governing archon of whatever element. If someday you have even the most minuscule potential to be one of the tides that could shatter the established world, you will be shackled to protect the unknowing."
It's just a way of foolproofing, of testing an idea.
How can I prove this wrong?
However, it never occurred to him that he might lack the ability to discover the truth.
Still, everything remained his current theory, not a fixed and certain rule.
So for now, he chose to share the theory with the fewest flaws.
However, if he were proven outright wrong in all his assumptions, well, that would be a good thing.
Isn't that what his initial goal was?
He could be completely wrong, discover that Visions are just limiters, and accept it with a simple, 'Hm, yeah, that could work.'
"..." Atsuko didn't know what to say to that.
It wasn't a huge deal whether she had one or not. She was just curious and a little excited at the idea.
Atsuko voiced a question: "Can you reveal the criteria, too? If it's not a dangerous secret, that is..."
Dantalion finally looked at Atsuko. Besides turning his head, he did nothing else--his body remained in the same position as before.
"No, it's not a problem." But he had to remind her of something important. "It's just that I, myself, am not yet fully convinced of it."
"Forget about it for now. I'll tell you when I'm sure of it. Even the gods don't have the objective truth behind it, so I'm walking blind with what I currently have."
He shook his head, thinking, 'And Ei is kind of pissing me off too--why the fuck won't she answer my calls?'
'I would've dismantled the Shogun if I could just to get her out, but...' His hands, interlocked and resting on his stomach, clenched as he thought of it.
'She's too strong.'
Then he went quiet.
To Kujou Sara and Dantalion, it didn't feel out of place--just another pause in the air.
But to Atsuko, who grew up around people who filled silence with small talk or nervous laughter, it was jarring.
He stopped speaking as if someone had cut the sound from the world. No hum, no sigh, no gesture to smooth it over.
Just stillness.
This made her aware of every faint noise around them.
Suddenly, as if saving her sanity, he spoke again.
"Now that you're cursed with knowledge and awareness, you probably would never have the chance to get one," Dantalion stated it plainly. "Having your reason overridden by passion is impossible for the knowing and aware."
"We can check it now if you want."
He suggested this while looking directly into Atsuko's eyes.
She couldn't help but divert her gaze elsewhere under that stare.
"It's harmless. You just have to do as I instruct you."
Atsuko thought for a moment, her eyes still trying their hardest not to look directly at him. In doing so, she caught a glimpse of Kujou Sara, who also seemed interested and was looking at her just like Dantalion.
"O... Okay..." But before she fully agreed: "As long as my memories won't be read by anyone but myself..." Her voice grew meeker and meeker as she spoke.
"Atsuko."
Dantalion's voice, though neutral, carried a tired implication.
"Do you have knowledge that is unknown to the majority of the world?"
"...No?" She answered, confused.
"Then there's nothing for me to look for in your head."
"Oh..."
"Yeah."
"..."
***
-=-
[Loudly Screaming Twig] : Wouldn't it be better if you just did it as soon as you can?
[I hump on Metals] : Ideally.
[Lost in the Glory of Holes] : Just say you're procrastinating...
[Beggiest Beggar of Begdom] : What a loser! HAHAHAHAH
[I hump on Metals] : The loser said as she laughed.
[Beggiest Beggar of Begdom] : Just finish yours already, lil bro, you're holding the group back LOL
-=-
For some reason, the group chat's vocabulary had evolved into calling each other "loser" at every opportunity.
This started because of Schulz boasting. They had forgotten how it came to be exactly, but it all started from that.
In Schulz's defense, he wasn't boasting--these "losers" just refused to listen properly.
However, what was clear in their minds was that it was boasting, and then he dislocated his shoulder.
His whining, groaning, wincing, spontaneous expletives, and self-reproaching bombardment became legendary.
'These retards...!' Schulz, known as [I hump on Metals] on the group chat, was seething.
Though Zhiqiong also humored the joke occasionally, it was different when Lepine-Pauline was doing it.
He had proposed to the system before--when he couldn't handle the teasing anymore, his embarrassment at its peak--to leave the group chat.
However, this damned system panel announced it into the group chat.
Saying:
===
System Panel: Announcement–
The individual [I hump on Metals] proposed to leave the Group Chat. The System Panel has detected the cause:
Individual [Beggiest Beggar of Begdom] and individual [Lost in the Glory of Holes] are warned to stop excessive teasing of individual–
===
He didn't even read further. He just closed it and refused to look at the group chat for a few hours.
Those two had probably made fun of him more upon seeing the announcement.
'And I'm about to finish it anyway.' He couldn't resist huffing as he pointed his hand, palm facing the sack in front of him.
They were right--he had procrastinated until the deadline neared.
His reaction was just a natural response to such bullshit.
Still, he knew they didn't really have a problem with it. They were just bored and had been given the chance to cure said boredom.
He, too, after all, had done it to them whenever the chance arose.
For example, when [Loudly Screaming Twig] sent a picture of [Beggiest Beggar of Begdom] in the group chat, seemingly dying and winded.
He was the loudest one who made fun of her, sending a resized, sometimes stretched version of the image into the group chat as a way to express various emotions about things.
'Now that I think about it, while [Loudly Screaming Twig] has never made fun of any of us, she was pretty evil for sending those pictures.' Delving further into his thoughts: 'Though it's probably better for the world that she is that way...'
He thought that if someone with the strength of [Loudly Screaming Twig] had a personality like, for example, some random opportunistic treasure hoarder, it would be catastrophic for everyone in that person's vicinity.
After all, anyone--Schulz believed, absolutely anyone--if given such strength, would lose every sense of responsibility unless they were faced by something stronger than themselves.
'Yep, it's indeed fortunate that Liliane is a good person...'
***
'He's practically saying I'm too stupid to be read...!' Atsuko felt like crying for a moment. However, that wasn't important right now. She hummed, nodding as if she'd agreed to be dissected.
Suddenly, Dantalion's smile deepened.
"I was just messing with you. There's no way to check it." A short laugh escaped from him. "You're so cute."
It seemed he just wanted to observe Atsuko's rich range of expressions.
Kujou Sara, seemingly finished eating, placed her tray on the table. Dantalion would dispose of it later.
"Wasting our time," Kujou Sara muttered.
She, too, was disappointed. In a single sitting, Dantalion had captured both their attention with ease, immersing both her and Atsuko in his words.
Thinking this should be the end of it, Kujou Sara brought back the topic from before their dinner.
"Where is the culprit?" She asked him again after sitting back in her seat.
Dantalion, looking at her, suggested, "Let's talk about it as we play a game, after Atsuko finishes, of course."
Atsuko, hearing her name mentioned, hurriedly picked up her food again and continued eating in haste.
"No need to rush it." His face held a strange expression as he watched Atsuko. Though he could understand the thought behind it, that didn't mean he wouldn't correct it. "Do it at your own pace, just like how we put down our own trays without waiting for you to finish. You should also follow your own speed."
While some people would lose confidence when being corrected over the smallest things, Dantalion was confident that Atsuko wouldn't be like that.
She was someone who had strived for independence since childhood. There was no way she'd be so easily discouraged.
If anything, her escape and tunnel vision before and during her escape were the strange parts. How could someone with experience and history like hers, who grew up striving for a single thing and considering everything related to it so she might achieve it someday, develop tunnel vision in a situation that didn't directly affect them?
She had no Vision, so she wasn't directly affected by the Vision Hunt. Nor was she an adventurer or an outlander who was the constant subject of inspection.
And she was a native of Inazuma, living on Narukami Island.
The increase in commercial rent only affected outlander merchants. The ban on Watatsumi imports and the Crystal Marrow delivery cancellation didn't affect them either.
Including the fact that though the Tenryou Commission seized all belongings and real estate of anyone who opposed the Vision Hunt Decree, Atsuko and her family hadn't done that.
What Atsuko did was violate the Sakoku decree. Due to that, her punishment was forced conscription to fight on the front lines.
She had grown up expecting to explore and navigate Inazuma first before even considering venturing outside to the rest of the nations.
And she hadn't even done that yet.
It was baffling.
To Dantalion, at least.
'Perhaps her intellect is just limited to this?'
And if he remembered correctly, upon leaving Inazuma, she stayed in Liyue for a long time doing manual labor. Nothing else.
Atsuko, in the game he remembered, didn't try to register as an adventurer. Perhaps she considered her combat ability lacking, so she decided she wanted to be a sailor to achieve her lifelong dream of seeing the world.
To her, both methods were the same--it was just a matter of capabilities.
Even so, Dantalion had resolved that now, though he might not have explicitly explained it to Atsuko, she knew that her safety, as long as she didn't do anything overly stupid, would be guaranteed by Dantalion.
That applied to her family, too.
'People should die of envy and seethe in anger, for I am the most extraordinary, humble, and good-natured civilized adult.'
Yep, without contact with Ei for such a period of time, he was slowly reclaiming his civilized adult status.
How dare that hag reduce him to a clueless child?
But she could be forgiven. He's a civilized adult.
A proper, functioning civilized adult will not hold grudges against artifacts--just agree with whatever nonsense they have to say, and forget about it afterwards. They only have a couple of years left to live anyway.
How can a civilized adult not protect their own peace of mind?
'Though it is satisfying to remind them that their time is limited.' As he thought that, he started setting up the game.
Atsuko, considerably slowing down her pace to eat her remaining food--though still faster than usual--watched him as he did it.
Dantalion decided to do it now because he predicted it would be about the same time Atsuko would finish, intending to time the game setup perfectly with Atsuko's meal.
He snapped his fingers, and a table, seemingly risen from the ground, solidified into a white, solid TV stand.
---
**-Chapter END-**
-Can we get this fic to at least have 10 reviews? I will release 5 Chapters at once if/when we hit that number. Webnovel doesn't show the ratings unless there are at least 10 reviews.